


Kitchen Disaster

by Kat Morgan (Wren_K)



Category: The Magnificent Seven (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-01
Updated: 2013-02-01
Packaged: 2017-11-27 19:00:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 843
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/665363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wren_K/pseuds/Kat%20Morgan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Short piece written for the prompt "kitchen disaster."  Mostly just noodling to get my hand back in the writing game.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Kitchen Disaster

Peck Carson was born under an unlucky star. His no-account-drifter pappy, according to legend, had taken one look at the raspberry patch that covered most of Pick’s left cheek and called the midwife a witch. Three days later, he and his pale young wife had skipped town in the middle of the night, pausing just long enough to dump the squalling infant on the midwife’s stoop. It was the start of a lifelong pattern for Peck – so called after “that peckerhead Carson” the only name anyone in town could hang around his pappy’s neck. 

Life as an abandoned child taught Peck to be hard and mean; to take his lumps and give as good as he got. Before long his face was found on wanted posters in half a dozen territories, and the artistic renditions of that hated raspberry patch grew ever more exaggerated.

The version the young lawman had tossed onto the table before him was a particularly despised likeness. Peck’s fork hovered just above the flaky top crust of what he knew in his heart to be the best apple pie he’d ever taste, the capper to a superb and pleasant meal. With a sigh, he set the fork down on the table and covered it with the napkin from his lap. 

“Peck Carson,” the boy said in a calm and steady voice, “you are under arrest for the crimes of-“

“I know the list,” Peck interrupted, his words chewed up into gravel. “I was there weren’t I?” The lawdog was young, but he moved like an old hand. That easy confidence got under Peck’s skin and made him itch to know if it had been earned or assumed. He flicked his eyes around the dining room. The few customers present were gawping with nervous attentiveness, trying to sidle out of the crossfire discretely. Only the dandy in the corner was giving any real interest to the exchange – a gambler by the look of him, Peck figured he was wondering if the pup had a sheet of paper with his face on it too. 

“I want you to use two fingers to unholster you sidearm and place it on the floor,” the kid said. His own gun, a showy Colt was leveled at Peck’s chest. 

Peck inhaled sharply, his only outward sign of surprise. Holy hell, but the kid had drawn that fast. Peck had missed the entire motion. Reevaluating his options, Peck did as ordered and played the meek little mouse. 

The gambler stepped up behind the kid, giving Peck his first opening. The kid glanced toward the approaching footsteps for a heartbeat and Peck laid him out with a wallop alongside the jaw. As the boy staggered back into the gambler, Peck caught his gun hand and wrenched the Colt free.

The gambler cried out a name. “JD!” So a friend then, that was disappointing. Peck didn’t stick around to make sure; he bolted toward the swinging door at the back of the room. A pursuing bullet sent splinters of doorframe streaking at his head. 

Peck tumbled into the kitchen, spilling across the floor in a tangle of legs and a curse for the damned star that dogged him. A formidable matron in a severe dress and ridiculously oversized apron began screeching at the intruder in a language only slightly less terrifying than the bullets behind him. The damsel in distress snatched up a cleaver and continued barking gibberish at him.

Astonishment pulled Peck’s flight up short. In the face of her Germanic fury, it didn’t even occur to him that a gun still trumped a meat cleaver. He set the gun down and stood up, hands raised appeasingly. And that’s when the two sons-a-bitches from the dining room tackled him. 

He staggered under their combined assault; keeping his feet for a few frantic moments while the dandy used every dirty wrestling trick in the book, and the kid appeared to be everywhere at once. The seething melee collided hard with a heavily burdened pie safe. All three went to the ground under an avalanche of the still screeching matron’s morning baking.

Peck shook off his attackers and writhed to all fours, slipping on the warm, sticky fruit that oozed across the floor. The two lawmen were right back in the fight, but having the same battle against the shattered pies as he was. Peck heaved himself forward, one knee slipped and he crashed heavily back to the floor. 

The kid was on his back again in an instant. Peck reared back, clawing blindly over his shoulder at the nuisance and gave a gratified smirk at the howl of pain his efforts won. Just a bit more and he’d be free – then the fight would be fair, for him anyway.

Grinning, and starting to enjoy himself, Peck gave another mighty surge forward and was summarily laid low by a cast iron skillet brandished masterfully by the furious cook. He dropped flat on his face, leaving the two lawmen on his back to face the wrath of the skillet wielder.


End file.
